We're filling the Gulf with oil, insanely spending a trillion a year on the military and fighting criminal wars, transferring wealth to the rich as fast as they can loot, letting a billion people go hungry every day because it's just too much trouble to care, making half-hearted attempts to deal with global warming, and at some point, one can't help but think we are really going to be sorry for what we are and are not doing at this particular point in history. That happy ending nonviolent revolution where the People take back the world from the corporations and their government and media courtiers doesn't seem very likely these days.
http://www.ianwelsh.net/global-warming-a-localized-pause-and-then-the-end-of-our-civilization/#commentsGlobal Warming: A localized pause and then the end of our civilizationLet’s talk a bit more about global warming and climate change. The majority of the American population now thinks that global warming probably doesn’t exist. Part of that is the huge amount of money which has been spent on propaganda, but part of it is that the only continent which is not experiencing increased temperatures right now—is North America. If you want to be a climate change denialist, America is a great place to live.
It is also true that the speed of global warming has slowed down. This is primarily due to two factors:
1) The sunspot cycle. Solar radiation is currently at its lowest level in some time. Less heat equals, well, less heat.
2) The icecap and glacial dump. The polar icepack being dumped into the oceans has had a cooling effect.
The sunspot cycle can change pretty much any time it wants. Probably we’ve got a decade or so at lower heat levels, but that’s not a sure thing. As for the icecap and glacier dump: well, once the ice is gone, it’s gone.
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Now, as for fixing it—there are two main problems. The first is the will to do something. While there may be technical solutions which would reduce the amount of carbon we are dumping into the atmosphere, there is no will to deploy them on a wide enough scale to matter. This is as true in China as it in the US, and without China and the developing world coming on board, what the US does, assuming it does anything, will not be sufficient (and the US will not do anything, the propaganda campaign claiming there is no Global Warming has been successful.)
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If world population is only reduced by a billion, I will be amazed. I also expect some serious wars. Our civilization will not go quietly into that long long night.